the mean of a sentence in English

Question

hi everyone . i have problem to understand a sentence which i bold it in the following text, i'm appreciate help me to catch the mean : ( its about a family who running a park business )

WOMAN : So have you finished your development of the site for the moment?

MAN : Not at all! We're constantly looking for ways to offer more to our visitors. The railway remains the central feature and there's now 1.2 kilometres of the line laid but we'd like to lay more. Because of the geology of the area, our greatest problem is digging tunnels. But we're gradually overcoming that. We're also very pleased with a new installation of the Go-Kart arena which is 120 square metres in area. Again the problem  is the geology; we had to level the mounds on the track for safety reasons. We wanted to enable 5–12 year olds to use the go-karts. And the main attraction here is the Formula 1 Kart. We've known fights to break out  over who gets it! And then finally to our most recent development which is the landscaped ...

Answer 1

I am not quite sure what you mean by the "mean" of a sentence. Do you mean "the meaning" of the sentence? If this is a comprehension issue, I believe the wording of the sentence poses a challenge. The sentence is awkward and confusing.

"We've known fights to break out over who gets it."

When this sentence stands alone, it is not clear what "who" refers to and what "it" refers too. These are possible pronoun reference issues, referring to a noun that each pronoun modifies -- which typically should appear in the prior sentence.

"It" clearly refers to "Formula 1 Cart" in the prior sentence.

However, the reference to "who" is unclear. "Who" is a relative pronoun. The only possible antecedent is "5-12 year olds." However, the sentence states "over who gets it" using the singular verb (gets) instead of the plural verb (get). But this version (over who get it) is also awkward and incorrect.

Perhaps a way to recast this sentence is to say "We have seen fights break out over who will get it." The action is in the future. (The fights break out over a future outcome.)

I would just simplify the sentence for clarity and say, "We have seen fights break out over it."

Answer 2

As a parent more than a tutor, I disagree that the fighting is an exaggeration. Notice that the man spoke of just one Formula 1 Kart. I can easily imagine children shoving each other out of the way to pretend they were racing a real F1 car among plain Go-Karts.

Answer 3

The sentence is referring to how excited the children get the Formula 1 go-carts. It is an exaggeration and not literal. The student get so excited they have an intense verbal exchange.

Answer 4

This is a strange sentence, so I can understand why it's confusing! Others have talked about the meaning related to the whole paragraph -- I'd like to talk about the parts of that sentence to make them clear one by one.

1. "We've known _____ to ______" -- this structure means we have seen something happen before. "Canadians have known snow to fall before September" means this has happened, but not very often. We also say in English, "I've been known to...", as in, "I"ve been known to drink 8 cups of coffee in one day." This means I like to drink a lot of coffee. How can I prove it? Well, people have seen me drink 8 cups in one day. It's not an exaggeration (which is a kind of lie). We use it to talk about an unusual but true situation.
2. "...break out..." -- a phrasal verb that has several meanings. Break out of prison = escape; break out in a rash = red spots appear on your skin; break out in violence/riot/fighting = some situation went from peaceful to not peaceful. In your example paragraph we are looking at this last type of break out -- fighting suddenly occurs for some reason. Both words in this phrasal verb are part of the structure from #1: "We've known fights to break out...."
3. "...over who gets it" -- this is confusing because you have a preposition, "over," that comes right after another word that can also be a preposition, "out." Since we know "out" belongs to the phrasal verb from #2, we can just look at "over who gets it." In this case, "over" has a meaning like "about," and explains why fights have broken out in the past: the Formula 1 kart is so popular that people will fight each other to see "who gets it," that is, for the chance to drive it or to have a turn. Other examples of "over" used this way:
4. We had an argument over whose turn it was to wash the dog. (The fight was about the job of washing the dog.)
5. I'm sick over this news report from Syria. (The news is so bad I am feeling very bad -- sad, angry, helpless... a mix of strong feelings.)
6. Their debate was over the right to free speech. (Free speech was the topic of their debate.)

I hope this is helpful! I know it's long, but the sentence you highlighted had several interesting structures all in a row.

Good luck with your ongoing studies!

Kat